Courtesy of Braun & Steidl ArchitectsNew plan for the future renovation of Howe Mansion and the administration building construction next door.

Board action begins construction processBy Jennifer Boresz

Cleveland State University's Board of Trustees met on Sept. 24 to authorize the advancement of university negotiations for the construction of an administration building/Howe Mansion project and a Recreation Center project.
The administration building will be somewhere between 30,000 to 40,000 square feet. Retail is expected to fill the first floor of the building with possibly a restaurant.

“There are a lot of reasons why it might be a good lunch place and certainly dinner when there are events going on. We would have a white-tablecloth kind of facility down here,” said Jack Boyle, vice president for business affairs and finance.

He continued, “Since we’ve got 950,000 people that go to the Convocation Center every year we were thinking, well, maybe we could share a piece of the convo market.”

Boyle said that he is excited for the approval to renovate Howe Mansion because the university has been trying to think of a way to save the building for years. So contractors will probably try to keep the first floor close to its original state and create meeting rooms. The second floor will house the graduate studies department.

The administration building is set to be built next to Howe Mansion with a small park area in between, according to architects Braun & Steidl’s street elevation and site plan.

The university authorized negotiations with City Architecture as the architectural and engineering services for the Administration Building/Howe Mansion project.

According to CSU’s Regional Economic Development plan, renovating the Howe Mansion and creating the Student Recreation Center and administration building fit into phase one of the neighborhood plan.

Phase two includes university parking facilities, a student union, campus bookstore and student housing. Cost of both stages is expected to be about $83 million.

The administrative project is exciting, but, Boyle said, “I’m more excited about the recreation center for a couple of reasons. First of all, it’s primarily a student building.”

“You (students) aren’t tremendously affected if there’s a new place to put my office or the president’s office as much as you are if there’s a rec center you can actually use,” he continued.

Universities across the country seem to be using recreation centers as university recruitment tools, and CSU should benefit from a new one, Boyle said.

The board authorized the university to work with Gilbane Building Co./Loncoleman Corp. as the construction managers and Weber Murphy Fox/Sasaki Associates as the architectural and engineering services for the Recreation Center project.

Boyle said that Sasaki Associates has probably done more recreation centers around the country than anyone else, and should help CSU accomplish their goals for the center.

“We are looking for something, that because of the location on Chester, has got to make a statement,” said Boyle.

The construction phase of Howe Mansion and the administration center should begin this spring, Boyle said, but development of the recreation center is less certain.

He said it depends on whether the university can tear down the current dome before summer because the International Children’s Games are going to be held in Cleveland this year, with the help of CSU. The university isn’t sure yet whether it will need the dome for the games, which occur at the end of July, or if it may be able to start construction in the spring.
Courtesy of Braun & Steidl ArchitectsA diagram of the future plan for the Howe Mansion renovation and the construction of the new administration building shown at both a street elevation and and overview site plan. Sketch from left to right at the top is the administartion building and then Howe Mansion.